Brianne & Billy

After we sent all our friends and family back home after our destination wedding, we were ready for some peace and quiet on our honeymoon. A few weeks later, we were whisked away for a short, but sweet, two-night stay in August of 2008 to magical Plymouth, California!

You might think Plymouth sounds boring, but we had the most fantastic time. Plymouth is a little known town in the center of the Shenandoah Wine Country east of Sacramento. We chose this quaint spot because of its unique small town charm. We didn't have tons of money or time, and we wanted that hometown attention to detail. We stayed at the Plymouth House Inn right in the center of town. We splurged on the best room they had, the Carousel Room, which had its own private hot tub and balcony attached. The Inn service was enticing and included two nights at the Inn, morning coffee delivered to our room on beautiful silver, full homemade buffet breakfast, wine and cheese appetizer hour in the afternoon, and a gift certificate to the renowned Taste Restaurant across the street. We could not pass up all that pampering!

We arrived in the afternoon, enjoyed a quick tour of the Inn and its antiques, and settled in to sip wine and taste appetizers at the Wine Hour set out just for us. We took a short nap before dinner and took a soak in the hot tub before slipping in to something a bit more formal for dinner at Taste. Words cannot describe the gastronomic delights we sampled later at Taste; this meal was the single most enjoyable meal we've ever had! Everything was fantastic, from the service to the food, from the wine to the dessert! We highly recommend the Mushroom Cigars, a small town secret! After dinner, we had an aperitif at the Taste Bar and headed back to our room.

We slept late, enjoyed coffee in bed, and went in to the main house for breakfast. We decided to spend our next day wine tasting in the country. There are too many wineries to choose from, but we settled on Karmere, Cooper, Dobra Zemlja, Amador Foothill Winery, and the Sobon Estate. The beauty of Amador County wineries is that you're likely to be served in a tasting by the owner or winemaker herself. It makes for an intriguingly personal experience and wineries here are not at all stuck up or pretentious. Everyone at each of the wineries was eager to answer our questions and served us graciously. Karmere was our favorite, as we had the chance to talk with the head winemaker, we chatted awhile, and we got to sample right from the barrel!

We loved driving along to find the wineries: winding down country roads, the windows down, the floral scented breeze blowing, the vineyards passing, all surrounded by wildflower strewn landscape. It was truly breathtaking. One of the best features of our honeymoon is that we did all of this for around $600, including the wine we purchased at the wineries. The region is so affordable; almost anyone can afford to come here! We'd definitely recommend Plymouth, and the surrounding region in the Shenandoah Valley. It's the California Gold Country, there's so much history here. Other attractions in the area are gold panning, antiquing, hiking, mountain biking, the old historical mining towns and their inhabitants. To get away from the hustle and bustle and relax in the country was so refreshing! We felt so at home and comfortable exploring this little town, and the extras were so worth it!